


don't think

by midnight_cowboy



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Altered State of Mind, Beholding, Drug Addiction, Forced Drug Rehabilitation, Gen, Headcanon, Headcanon Backstory, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Manipulation, Minor Character Death, Possession, Recreational Drug Use, english... still not my first language, no beta. we die. just die., repetitive form fic, spoilers up to ep158 reveal obv
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2021-01-23 03:47:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21313669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnight_cowboy/pseuds/midnight_cowboy
Summary: don't think about Elias Bouchard.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 74
Collections: Real Elias Bouchard Fics





	don't think

**Author's Note:**

> repetetive play fic, made after official discord server said ‘yes?? this sounds great’ and I tried to make it a small post, but it went out of hand. my headcanons mostly.

don’t think about Elias Bouchard, small and both too afraid and too brave, being aware about his relation to the Eye from the beginning of his life, but never able to put the proper name about Too Aware But I (Eye) Must See. 

don’t think about him, struggling with the knowledge being finally put into work inside of his mind, with education and experience making it better and worse at the same time, and in early teens encountering that getting high is one of the only ways to stop being so hungry for knowledge, from Seeing too much.

don’t think about Elias ‘just call me Eli!’ Bouchard, miraculously going through university not by the way of money, but by accidenatlly Knowing and talking at the same time, and afterwards being forced to find a job, otherwise left without any funds for drugs that save him from constantly Beholding.

don’t think about him entering The Magnus Institute, the name Known on an accident, and him only sending his CV after no other place hired him, and for the first time not being able to Know something (someone), when James Wright himself hires Eli on the spot, eyes crinkling brightly (too bright), and a fear of not being the _Watcher,_ but rather being _Watched_ for the first time enters the heart of a new artifact storage assitant.

don’t think about how others judge him, quickly, even _too quickly_, as a junkie who got the job because of his family, or maybe by doing some favours, or something else, maybe even _worse_; but those who work with him directly know how even stoned out of his own mind Eli is _scary_ efficient, being better than any filing system and finding everything needed with his eyes closed.

don’t think about Getrude ‘don’t you call me _Gertie_, Elias’ Robinson, whose distaste for the young man is visible to everyone but Eli himself, who is drowning in the new attachment to the Head Archivist, whose actions and thoughts and just everything about her is so in sync with his own mind (like an island amidst the constant storm, a dangerous one of course, but _safe land_ compared to everything else) that he throws everything into showing her he could be a friend.

don’t think about Gertrude figuring out just how touched by the Eye this annoying boy from artifact storage is, even if it’s the smallest things of making her tea exactly how she likes it, finding the files needed even before she asks for them, and being annoying in _not_ constantly hovering over herm but rather _knowing_ when she’s amicable to his presense and when she’s not.

don’t think about Gertrude forcing him to go sober, as in literally _forcing_, for a couple of days, tricking and keeping him under her personal watch in the Archives, feeding some half-baked lie to the Artifact department (no one really cares but James Wright, whose smile was almost splitting his face when he reclined onto his office chair, watching all of this unfold), just so she could test out few of her theories, and when she hurts him most, Eli hurts her back by putting all the knowledge he was experiencing at the moment into her head. 

don’t think about how she, for the first time in some years visibly unsettled, has to give him the fix, and Eli’s hands shaking much harder than any time under influence of narcotics, and him openly weeping the entire time, exhausted and betrayed, never able to find peace in her presence afterwards.

don’t think about Eric Delano, one of the last people who was at least somewhat friendly to Eli, even if also somewhat dismissive, resigning from the Institute and Eli instantly knowing _how_, breaking down crying not for the first and not for the last time just that month, and then diving for the first sharp object he finds.

don’t think about James Wright, who _isn’t_ James Wright, out of nowhere catching the hand with the boxcutter and tutting at a terrified young man, whose body and abilities are simply too precious to be wasted.

don’t think about Eli Bouchard being completely aware beforehand that Jonah _will _succeed in trapping him as a new host, because of how much Beholding depends on that way of everything falling into place, but also doesn’t care much about Elias _knowing _what will happen.

don’t think about him being alone, but also _not_, being constantly under watch as to not cause some stupid overdose accident (’poor soul, taking solace in drugs from horrors of this world’, is the honey-laced not-lie formed by mouth of James Wright, voice of Jonah Magnus, who holds Elias’ hand in the ER, the latter hating hating _hating_ it, ‘but I must say that punishing him at work might only push him towards the edge, don’t you agree, officers?’) or other bodily harm – no one cares about mental one in this institution, not really.

don’t think about him trying and trying and _trying_ to come up with back up plans so if he’s not to survive possession, someone else might be aware of the horrors happening and maybe, just maybe, _save _people, even just _one _person that might come after his body’s time comes up, but being played at every corner.

don’t think about him refusing to fall into despair, even as the hold of Jonah Magnus’ manipulations tightens on him, even when he’s watching himself as if from outside his own body, forcibly cleaned from addictions and relationships, watching being promoted and promoted and promoted, watching James Wright’s old, slightly shaking hands on his shoulders, guiding his eyes onto all the knowledge about the Institute and then the Eye, because between all of this there are still moments of being himself, and being calm, and finding sparks of hope.

don’t think about all of that being snatched away as Eli Bouchard, sitting in his office, suddenly Knows that James Wright’s heart is about to stop, and gripping the sides of the table and still refusing to go without a fight, muttering ‘don’t know, and I don’t think–’

I. I don’t think…

don’t think, Eli.

_don’t._

_…_

** _see._ **

not so hard, is it.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm also on [tumblr](https://rinnannon.tumblr.com/) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/rinnannon).


End file.
